Isabel's Run

by M. D. Grayson

  But as I looked around, I became certain that this was not the case. “It’s not her,” I said to Toni.

  “You don’t know that,” she said, continuing to stare at the front door.

  “Yeah, I do. Look at these mutts here.”

  She glanced at the men seated against the wall.

  “So?”

  “He’s not here,” I said.

  “What’s that?” Nancy asked. She’d been listening to us.

  “Donnie Martin isn’t here,” I said.

  “Isn’t that his car?” she asked, pointing to the white BMW beside us.

  I nodded. “Yeah, it is. But he’s not here.”

  Nancy turned to Radovich. “Anyone else inside?” she asked.

  Radovich spoke into his radio, then turned to her. “This is it,” he said. “All present and accounted for.”

  I motioned Nancy and Radovich away from the detainees so we wouldn’t be overheard.

  “We’ve got a problem,” I said. “Donnie Martin isn’t here. Neither is Crystal Wallace. Neither is DeMichael Hollins. And neither is Toni’s sister Kelli.” I looked over at Toni. “I’m pretty certain the girl they bring out isn’t going to be Kelli Blair.”

  I continued. “But Martin’s going to find out about this bust pretty quick. And when he does, we don’t know how he’s going to react, but it probably won’t be good. You better make sure you collect up all the cell phones from these guys. We need to find him and bust him pretty damn quick.” I looked up to make sure Toni wasn’t listening. “And there’s no telling what he’ll do if he suspects Kelli Blair is somehow involved.”

  “There’s nothing to make him start thinking that, is there?” Nancy asked.

  I thought for a minute. Then, slowly, shook my head. “I don’t think so,” I said. “Unless she talks, and there’s no reason for her to do that. But still, trying to match wits with a lunatic is a dangerous game.”

  “He’s right,” Tyrone said, “this guy’s a wacko. He might start lashing out just because she coincidentally shows up the day before the raid.”

  “Like I said,” I repeated. “We need to find Donnie Martin. And hopefully Kelli.”

  “Okay. Got any ideas where we should start?”

  “Toni,” I called out. She turned to look at me. “Do you remember what kind of car DeMichael Hollins drives?”

  “Dark red Ford Expedition. Maroon, maybe.” I looked around, but I already knew the answer. There was no dark red Ford Expedition there.

  “There’s your answer,” I said. “Martin and Crystal and probably Kelli came over here, and then they all loaded up in DeMichael Hollins’s Expedition and took off. That’s what we need to be looking for. You should have all the details in the surveillance report I gave you.”

  “I’ve got it,” Nancy said, pulling a vehicle report we’d given her from a file. “Ty, call it in, will you? It’s a 2009 Ford Expedition, maroon in color, Washington tags: 585-UWW.”

  “Got it,” Tyrone said.

  * * * *

  I wouldn’t say that I had a bad feeling about things, but I was definitely starting to get a little uneasy. I suppose we should have known there was no guarantee that Martin and Crystal and Kelli would be at the house, but with his car parked there, it had seemed a reasonable expectation. I suppose that just because Martin went to the boys’ house at the same time every day that we had him under surveillance didn’t mean he was guaranteed to be there today. Still, we’d hoped to end this right now.

  Five minutes later, they brought the victim up. Toni had been staring at the door, but when the men and the gurney started to come out, she turned away and buried her face in my shoulder, unable to watch. Toni is tough as they come, but I guess the thought of her sister being rolled out on a stretcher was maybe a little too hard to take. I watched for both of us. Two SWAT officers assisted two EMTs—one on each corner—as they carried the girl out on the gurney. The EMTs had already started an IV, and a fifth person carried the IV bag. I strained to see who the victim was. At first, I couldn’t see her face—she was blocked by the guys—but judging by the way one arm was sort of halfway flopped off the gurney, it sure looked like she was unconscious. Then, I caught a glimpse of her. Her small face was bruised and swollen, but I recognized her. I looked down at Toni.

  “It’s okay, Toni,” I said. “It’s not Kelli.”

  “No?” She turned to look.

  “No,” I said. “It’s Isabel. And I hate to say it, but she doesn’t look too good.”

  Chapter 26

  AS SOON AS they were out the front door, the EMTs extended the wheels on the gurney and started to roll it to the waiting ambulance. The EMT walked alongside, trying to hang Isabel’s IV bag on a stand mounted to the moving gurney. Toni walked quickly in their direction after I identified Isabel. I followed.

  The EMT noticed Toni walk up and guessed correctly that she was about to be questioned. “Relative?” she asked as she worked.

  Toni shook her head. “Investigator. And friend.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Isabel Delgado,” Toni said. “What happened to her?”

  “The poor girl’s been beaten—probably with a club of some sort and maybe a belt, judging from the looks of it. She’s lucky she’s alive.”

  “Is she conscious?” Toni asked.

  The EMT shook her head. “Not really. She’s kind of in and out of it. I think she’s been drugged—no telling with what—we can’t determine that here. I think her arm’s broken there,” she pointed. “And she’s had internal injuries, too, that much I can say for sure. She’s been bleeding vaginally. She’s got blood all over her legs.” I looked at the sheet that covered Isabel from the waist down, but I couldn’t see any blood.

  “Will she be alright?” Toni asked.

  The EMT held a finger up to her lips, indicating that Toni should be careful about asking such questions in the event Isabel could hear what was going on. Then she shrugged her shoulders and opened her hands up in the universal “who knows” signal. But, apparently for Isabel’s benefit in the event she was able to hear, she said, “Of course she will. Do you hear that, Isabel?” to the motionless girl. “You’re going to be fine. You just hang in there for us—we’re going to take good care of you. And you’re going to be fine.”

  Toni cringed. “Where are you going to take her?” she asked.

  “We need to get her straight to the university medical center ER,” the EMT said quietly. “If she’s still bleeding internally, that has to be stopped right away.” She turned to the other EMT. “Ready,” she said. Together, they rolled the gurney up to the back of the ambulance. Then, when they pushed forward on the gurney, the legs folded up and tucked under as the gurney slid inside. The third team member had already entered and was waiting at the head of the gurney.

  “Hello, Isabel,” he called out animatedly. “We’re taking you to the hospital now. We’re going to take good care of you, and you’ll be just fine.” He immediately started a transfusion as the two EMTs outside slammed the doors shut and sprinted for the doors. They fired up the ambulance’s diesel engine and pulled away. A second later, the siren blasted to life across what had been a peaceful neighborhood up until about twenty minutes ago.

  Toni stood and watched the ambulance drive away. I walked up close behind her and put my hand on her shoulder. Together, we watched the ambulance drive up the street.

  “You alright?” I asked.

  She nodded. I leaned around her so that I could see her face. She was biting her lip, and tears were streaming down her face. “Jesus Christ,” she said. “Did you see her? These guys are animals, Danny,” she said. “And Kelli’s still out there.”

  I watched the ambulance round the corner onto Sixty-Fifth Street. I didn’t say it, but I was thinking, Better out there than in the back of that thing.

  * * * *

  “The house is all yours,” Gary Radovich said to Dave Bryant. “Ready to be searched. Pretty sure we didn’t miss any b
ad guys.” He had a sly grin. “You should be alright.”

  “Oh, thanks a whole hell of a lot,” Bryant said.

  Radovich laughed. “Happy to be of service,” he said. The SWAT officers were all out of the house now and on their way to the SWAT truck at the CP. “We’re going to head out. We’ve got three more of these scheduled today down south.”

  “Thanks, Gary,” Nancy said. “You guys were total pros, as always. We’ve got two more houses to take down.”

  “We aim to please,” Radovich said. He turned to Toni and me. “Sorry we didn’t find your sister here,” he said to Toni. “But judging by the condition of the other girl, maybe that’s a good thing.”

  Toni nodded. “Thanks,” she said.

  “You ought to have enough to charge these guys, though—right, Nancy?”

  “Absolutely,” she said. “At this point, even if the search doesn’t turn up any dope, these idiots are all going to jail,” Nancy said, pointing to the men sitting against the wall. “If nothing else, we’ll charge them with assault, and I think we can charge them with trafficking, as well.”

  “You don’t need to worry about finding dope,” one of the SWAT team members who’d been in the house said as he walked to the truck. “It’s like a pharmacy in there.”

  “Yeah,” his partner said, “the kitchen pantry has about twenty-five pounds of high-grade pot inside.”

  “You should be able to stick them with some sort of firearms charge, too,” the first officer said. “There’s a regular arsenal in the basement. And, from the looks of it, several of the guns down there aren’t exactly what you’d call legal—some of ’em even look like they’re full auto.”

  “And some of the shotguns are sawed off,” the other officer said.

  “Jackpot,” Dave Bryant said, smiling. “So we’ve got ’em for possession, possession with intent to distribute, trafficking, ag assault, ag battery, firearms violations—and maybe more. Who knows? Not their lucky day.” He turned to his crew. “Let’s go, boys,” he said. He led his eight-man team inside to begin the long task of thoroughly searching the house.

  “I want to go inside, too,” Nancy said. “Have a look around. But we only have a minute. I want to roll to the house on Nineteenth—,” she looked at me, “I think you guys call it the ‘girls’ house.’ Then we’ll swing on up and hit the house on Fortieth—the ‘big’ house. Also, hopefully, I’ll be able to talk to Isabel at the hospital later this afternoon. I’m hoping she can give us information on Donnie Martin, DeMichael Hollins, and Crystal Wallace. Even if she can’t, though, based on everything that’s going on around here, I’m sure I can get arrest warrants for the three of them. Ty—why don’t you call the office and get that started.”

  “Got it,” Ty said.

  “Meanwhile,” Nancy said, “maybe Kelli will find out about this bust some way and just decide to walk away now. She’ll figure out that Isabel was rescued. And with Isabel safe, there’s no reason for her to hang around with Donnie Martin anymore.”

  “If she finds out about the bust and if she’s allowed to simply leave,” I said. “Neither of those is automatic—at least not right away.”

  She thought about this. “Where else would they be?”

  “My guess is if they find out about the bust, they’ll either run past the house on Fortieth—it’s Donnie Martin’s residence—or else they may hightail it to the neighborhood where they’re originally from.”

  “Central District?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. They might figure that they need to lay low. Someone over there would probably take them in.”

  “They wouldn’t take Kelli there, would they?”

  I shook my head. “I can’t see why they would. They’d probably just jettison her when they find out what’s happened.” I didn’t want to consider the fact that in the event they decided they didn’t want any witnesses, things could go badly for Kelli. The thought made me shudder.

  Nancy nodded, thinking. Then she said, “That makes sense. I’ll tell Ty to alert the East Precinct. We can get—.” Suddenly, my cell phone rang, interrupting her. Caller ID: Doc.

  “What’s up?” I said.

  “They just pulled up,” Doc said. I turned and whispered to Nancy. “Donnie Martin just drove up to the house on Fortieth.”

  Everyone turned to me and froze.

  “Who all is there?” I asked Doc.

  “Martin, Hollins, Crystal, and Kelli.”

  “Outstanding.”

  “What?” Nancy said.

  “Donnie Martin and DeMichael Hollins plus Crystal Wallace and Kelli.”

  “Dude,” Doc said. “They’re moving shopping bags.”

  “They’re what?”

  “They’re moving shopping bags,” he said.

  I turned to Nancy. “They’ve been shopping.”

  “Do they seem nervous or alarmed?” I asked Doc.

  “No. They’re just standing around talking, shooting the shit.”

  I turned to Nancy. “They don’t even seem to know there’s been a raid here. We need to move fast before they put in a phone call and figure it out.”

  She nodded. “Got it.”

  “Good work, dude,” I said to Doc. “We’ll be right there. If Donnie Martin leaves before we get there, follow ’em. But we’ll be there in under ten minutes.” I hung up.

  Nancy put two fingers in her mouth and gave a surprisingly loud whistle. “I need everyone who’s scheduled to take part in the next takedown to assemble here, now!” She shouted. “We have new information. If you’re not involved in the search or the transport of those guys, we need you over here real quick,” she yelled out to the officers.

  “Ty! Call in and get these guys some more backup to help process this gang.”

  “Right!” Ty said.

  Nancy assembled her troops. There were twelve officers in six patrol cars. She pointed to three patrol teams. “We’ll all head out of here north on Brooklyn.”

  “We’re in the park,” one of the officers said. “Shall we just shoot through?”

  “Absolutely,” Nancy said. “You all use the park if you’re blocked. We’ll all shoot across Sixty-Fifth together. We’ll go in Code 3 until we get to Thirty-Fifth but after Thirty-Fifth, lights only. This is important—I want no sirens east of Thirty-Fifth. Everybody understand?”

  The nine men and three women nodded.

  “Good. We’ll make two groups.” She pointed to three patrol officer teams. “You, you, and you—approach from the south. Tyrone and I will lead you guys in. Our group will turn on Thirty-Fifth, go down the street and around the block so we can come up on Fortieth from the south. Last guy in, seal off the street. You, you, and you—,” she pointed to the other three patrol teams, “you approach from the north. Come in off Sixty-Fifth and turn right on Fortieth—straight shot in. Last guy in, seal the street off. You guys coming in from the north—you have a shorter way to go, so don’t come around the corner until you see me pulling up. The subject house is only three or four houses from the corner.” She turned to me. “Is that right, Danny?”

  “That’s it,” I said.

  She turned back to the officers. “I don’t want you getting there ahead of us. We have confirmation that Donnie Martin, DeMichael Hollins, and Crystal Wallace are there, along with another female who is not part of the investigation. And all of you—remember—assume that they’re armed and dangerous. Be careful. Any questions?”

  There were none.

  “Let’s go,” she said. We all sprinted toward our cars.

  Chapter 27

  NANCY AND TYRONE gave the patrol officers a few seconds to make it back to their cars and get going. Then, the two of them jumped into her silver Crown Vic and burned rubber pulling out—she drove. She hadn’t made it clear where she wanted us. Since we were civilians, most likely she wanted us in the back, safely out of harm’s way. But then again, she hadn’t actually said anything. Since we were parked right behind her, I took off as soon as she left and
fell in right on her bumper. I never liked being in the back.

  The patrol car that had been blocking traffic onto Brooklyn from the north had already swung out across Sixty-Fifth and stopped, blocking traffic for us. Nancy took advantage of this as she switched on her lights and siren and rounded the corner onto Sixty-Fifth. “Hold on,” I yelled to Toni as we blew around the corner behind her. Six more patrol cars followed, right behind us, all with lights flashing and sirens on. Talk about an adrenaline rush! I hadn’t been “Code 3” since my earliest CID training days. Part of the curriculum was serving six months as an MP—for me, this meant at Fort Lewis near Tacoma. Occasionally, we’d been involved with a chase—usually of a soldier who’d had a little too much fun at one of the local drinking establishments. The MPs on gate detail take a dim view of soldiers who crash through without clearance.

  As we hustled eastbound, I noticed that Northeast Sixty-Fifth Street gradually changed character from almost pure residential where we started to almost pure commercial by the time we crossed Twenty-Fifth Avenue Northeast. We picked up speed. Ten blocks later, we slowed again as we reached Thirty-Fifth. It had taken about two minutes to cover the mile between Brooklyn and Thirty-Fifth. As we reached the intersection, I hit the speed dial on my cell phone for Doc. I put it on speakerphone and when he answered, I said, “How we looking?”

  “They’re all still inside,” he said.

  “Good. We’re only a few blocks away now.”

  “I know. I can hear you. You guys gonna turn them sirens off?”

  At that moment, Nancy turned her siren off, and everyone else followed suit. I smiled. “How’s that for service?” I asked, as we made the turn southbound on Thirty-Fifth.

  “Cool. See you in a minute.”

  I watched in the rearview mirror as three patrol cars followed us onto Thirty-Fifth while the other three went straight through the intersection.

  “You ready to go get Kelli?” I asked Toni.

  She nodded. I saw her hand gripping the door, tightly.